Chapter 103

“Ah, ah!”

A short voice burst from my mouth.

Seeing Hyuk-seo’s head fly and roll to the ground filled me with deep rage.

Yet, I was still holding onto Si-ho.

“F*ck, f*ck!”

I was angry.

Swear words kept threatening to spill out.

But I couldn’t miss the method Hyuk-seo had created by sacrificing himself.

As soon as Hyuk-seo’s neck was severed, the shadow wall behind me collapsed.

Kerafe’s bullet was fired.

Crackle!

The fired Kerafe bullet shattered the shadow wall.

Seeing that, I kicked off with Si-ho in my arms.

Crash!

I leaped through the broken shadow wall to the rooftop across the building.

The wind rushing past me gave a sense of floating.

The sky was already tinted with sunset.

Only then did I realize I had escaped the shadows.

Landing safely on the opposite rooftop, I bit my lip hard.

Si-ho in my arms was still unconscious.

The shadows were writhing uncontrollably from the shock of Hyuk-seo’s death.

It was as if they were dying along with Hyuk-seo.

But Hyuk-seo had said that even if he died, part of the shadows would move under Erebus’s control.

I had to keep running.

At that moment, I saw it.

The shadows caught Hyuk-seo’s collapsing body and lifted his severed head, reattaching it.

Black shadows flowed between Hyuk-seo’s severed neck, connecting it.

“You bastard!”

A furious curse burst from my mouth.

I realized Erebus was even using Hyuk-seo’s death for his own purposes.

[The God of Darkness is watching you.]

At that moment, an alien voice echoed in my head.

“Cough!”

Simultaneously, a coughing sound came from within the shadows.

Hyuk-seo opened his eyes, black shadows flowing from his mouth.

Realizing the situation, his eyes widened.

Erebus was forcibly keeping him alive to use his shadows.

Our eyes met.

Hyuk-seo looked at the shadows enveloping his body and signaled to me.

Go.

That’s what he was saying.

Seeing that, I increased my running speed.

Thud!

At that moment, something leaped down behind me.

There was a shadow monster.

The shadow monster, holding Hyuk-seo like a stuffed doll, began chasing me with its six legs, dripping sticky shadows.

I was being chased by a shadow monster.

But the shock of Hyuk-seo’s death seemed to have affected the shadows, as it wasn’t that fast.

Erebus also couldn’t control the shadows freely.

Thump!

The monster slammed its legs into the ground.

Shadows surged from the ground, attacking me.

I quickly shielded Si-ho and rolled on the ground.

“Ugh.”

Groaning, I got up and rolled again.

Shadows attacked me once more from the ground.

Shadows were everywhere.

So, they kept attacking me.

While I was rolling, the shadow monster closed the distance between us.

‘Damn it.’

Simultaneously, shadows rose from all sides, trying to trap me again.

This would end the same way.

“Damn you, Erebus!”

At that moment, Hyuk-seo, who had been devoured by the shadow monster, shouted as if spitting blood.

The shadows trying to trap me hesitated for a moment.

It seemed Hyuk-seo had resisted.

Seeing that, I got up and started running again.

But that wasn’t the solution.

Even if Hyuk-seo resisted briefly, the shadow monster was chasing us again.

At this rate, it’s unclear whether we’ll meet the Association’s Returners or Giraseong’s Returners first.

Moreover, Erebus, regardless of his current situation, would surely break free from the Association and head this way.

Dimensional Beings were still running around below the building.

In the distance, a few Hunters were seen confronting those Dimensional Beings.

But the Hunters probably couldn’t stop the shadow monster.

I had to solve this here.

“Hyuk-seo! Tell me any method!”

My Aura wasn’t much left.

Having used it several times before, I might run out while running.

So, I shouted to Hyuk-seo, revived by the shadows.

“There’s a core inside the shadow!”

At that moment, Hyuk-seo, having thought of a way to resolve this, answered.

“Before, the core was separate from me, but now it’s connected to me! I’ll expose it for a moment, can you shoot it?”

As Hyuk-seo shouted, I gripped Kerafe.

Shooting while running was incredibly difficult.

But it seemed the only way.

Even so, I had heard that Baeksan had talent in shooting.

It wasn’t impossible.

“Give me a signal!”

I loaded Thunderbolt’s bullet.

Carrying Si-ho made it difficult, but there was no choice.

“Now!”

As soon as Thunderbolt was loaded, Hyuk-seo shouted.

I immediately twisted my body and aimed the gun.

Creak!

A strange sound came from the shadow monster as part of its body split open.

A heart-like mass was pulsating at its center.

I pulled the trigger immediately.

Crackle!

The fired Thunderbolt bullet sparked and collided with the shadow’s core.

Did it work?

As that thought briefly crossed my mind, I was knocked to the ground by an impact on my side.

“Cough, ugh.”

Blood flowed from my mouth, soaking the ground.

A few ribs seemed broken.

Fortunately, Si-ho, shielded by my body, was unharmed.

It was the shadow that had hit me.

Looking up, the shadow core was only slightly damaged.

‘My firepower was insufficient.’

It was an opportunity Hyuk-seo had barely created.

But my firepower was lacking.

I bit my bleeding lip hard.

Once again, I acutely felt my weakness.

Meanwhile, the shadow monster pushed Hyuk-seo further inside.

Simultaneously, shadows wrapped around his mouth, trying to silence him.

Our eyes met.

The deep regret in Hyuk-seo’s eyes made me rise again.

You think I did all this to see those eyes.

“Spit.”

I spat blood and gritted my teeth.

How many times have I failed in my life?

I can fail again.

“Hyuk-seo, just one more time.”

I knew it wasn’t easy, but I said it to Hyuk-seo.

Hyuk-seo couldn’t give me signals anymore.

But even so, we had raided boss monsters in games countless times without signals, syncing our breaths.

This situation was the same.

Hyuk-seo was the tank, I was the DPS.

The tank creates the situation, the DPS catches it and deals precise damage.

Hyuk-seo and I locked eyes again.

I felt his eyes saying, “I understand.”

I slowly set Si-ho down.

The shadows wouldn’t attack Si-ho.

Erebus didn’t want Si-ho harmed.

Moreover, Hyuk-seo’s suicide had destabilized the shadows, and with his resistance, it wouldn’t be easy to take Si-ho.

The shadow monster’s movements were still sluggish.

So, the shadow’s first choice would be to kill me, then Erebus would come to take Si-ho.

‘And I absolutely won’t let that happen.’

A hint of madness seemed to flash in my eyes.

But it didn’t matter now.

Swish!

As soon as I set Si-ho down, the shadow charged at me faster than before.

The shadow couldn’t make aggressive attacks while I held Si-ho.

So, as soon as I let go, it sped up to kill me.

The shadow, shaped like a drill, seemed ready to pierce me.

I desperately dodged.

Thud, thud, thud!

The shadow chased me, creating holes in the ground.

My broken ribs stabbed my lungs, making breathing difficult.

Even my side screamed in pain, as if my organs were damaged.

I had overused my Aura before, but this level of damage was only the second time since Yekaterina and Kaito.

Yet, I suppressed the pain and dodged the shadows.

If I lost focus, I’d be gone instantly.

At that moment, the shadow monster began chasing me again.

As I thought, it prioritized killing me over Si-ho.

‘Baeksan.’

Baeksan’s image came to mind.

Baeksan always showed how to use Aura directly.

Every time, it was awe-inspiring, and I often wondered if I could ever do that.

“The total amount of Aura? Of course, it’s important. But listen, Kang Ha-chan. What’s more important than Aura is proficiency. Even if you have a tiny bit of Aura left, if your proficiency is high, the total amount becomes meaningless.”

As proof, Baeksan overwhelmed Eun-namu even after using a day’s worth of Aura.

“Aura is like a raw gem. At first, it’s just a stone, but as you polish it, it becomes a gem. The way you’re using Aura now is no different from using raw stones.”

The purity of Aura isn’t related to its total amount.

It’s solely about how much an individual polishes and refines it.

In battles against the strong, what’s needed isn’t the total amount of Aura but such proficiency.

The remaining Aura in my body was barely 1%.

But this 1% was the purest Aura in the world, refined by Baeksan.

If I polished this Aura to its limit.

It would become a Thunderbolt bullet purer than 100% output.

Crack!

My mental limit was fully transmitted to Thunderbolt.

In this moment, just once.

I had to surpass my limits.

Crackle!

A more intense spark than ever burst from Thunderbolt.

The intense shock tore the sleeve of my shirt.

The bullet turned from red to pure white.

I loaded that bullet into Kerafe.

Click-

The sound of metal clicking as three shadows rushed at me simultaneously.

Watching that, a smile formed on my lips.

Hyuk-seo and I locked eyes.

All those times we synced in games were for this moment.

Swoosh!

The shadow monster’s core split.

But the shadow monster, not wanting to be defeated again, curled up to hide its core.

But it was meaningless.

Swish!

The shadow attacked where I had just been.

But the shadow floated aimlessly, as if it had lost its target.

My vision was different now.

I was facing the sunset sky.

On the building’s rooftop.

The monster, crouching and exposing its shadow core on its back.

Was stupidly looking forward.

Meanwhile, the girl leaning against the rooftop wall reached out to me.

Si-ho had regained consciousness.

I had only been buying time until Si-ho woke up.

Looking at the exposed shadow core, I smiled.

“Hey, give me my brother back.”

And I pulled the trigger.

Bang!

The Thunderbolt bullet fired from the barrel.

It wasn’t the explosive sound like before.

If the previous Thunderbolts were like tank shells.

This one was like a sniper’s shot.

The Thunderbolt bullet shattered the shadows rushing in and struck the shadow core.

The bullet, polished to its limit, was more than enough to destroy the shadow monster’s core.